An interesting discussion is presently taking place on Facebook where what may well be an innovative style of standard design has been shown the light of day.

The South African armorial bearings, badge and standard of Mr. Bob Juchter van Bergen Quast have recently been publicised on Facebook and I found it interesting to see how the Bureau have displayed the badge in the standard and also taken charges from the arms. I would be interested to see the blazon for the badge and for the standard to see how what appears to be the oval field of the badge is taken forward to become the first section of the standard. It is also an innovative (and very pleasing) use of the leopards’ heads in the standard. It is good to see such design interpretations from The Bureau of Heraldry of South Africa; this may be breaking new ground.

Curious - why would a German baron or other noble, who presumably would already be armigerous, need to register his arms in South Africa? Unless perhaps that's where he lives... In any case, I agree with Martin that it's an innovative design for the standard.

I vaguely recall online discussion of these arms and the unique standard weeks or months ago, but don't recall mention of him being a baron - though I could have missed it.

Mr v Bergen Quast has worked hard to prove that he is entitled to the HRE title of Freiherr. To achieve this he has linked in a curious way authorities in the Netherlands, Austria, Scotland and South Africa, together with the former kingdom of Bourbon-Sicily. What he seems to have failed to do yet is prove his blood connection to the v Quasts. For some reason he has registered the v Quast arms from 1790 at the S African Bureau of Heraldry, but then had different arms registered by the same Bureau for himself.

Natalie Declare wrote:Some people desire their own arms created just for them rather than assuming the arms of an family member and South Africa grants some pretty nice Armorial Bearings so why not use them?

But as I pointed out, Mr v Bergen Quast went to great lengths to establish a connection to a noble German family. Having done so he has arrogated to himself the title of Freiherr. He even had the noble arms recorded in South Africa's heraldic registry, though there was no need to do so as they are already recorded in the heraldic records of the HRE. But then he has totally new arms designed for his use, arms that have no link to the noble family he claims to derive his title from. This lacks logic both from an heraldic and a genealogical perspective.

Chris GreenPresident of the International Association of Amateur Heralds